Stock Update (NYSE:MS): Veritas takeover bond relaunched: source

[Reuters – UK Focus] – The unsecured bond pulled in November to help finance Carlyle’s acquisition of Veritas has been relaunched, a source close to the situation told IFR on Monday. News (Other OTC: NWSAL – news) of the revived deal came shortly after both Moody’s and S&P assigned fresh ratings to the overall financing package backing Carlyle’s purchase of Veritas from Symantec. Sources told IFR that Morgan Stanley (Xetra: 885836 – news) , lead-left on the bond when it was pulled, was pitching an unsecured US$825m bond around 88 cents on the dollar to yield around 13%. Read more on this. Morgan Stanley (MS) , with a current value of $51.97B, opened at $26.72. Looking at the equity, the company’s one day range is $26.60 to $26.94 and has traded between $21.16 and $41.04 over the past 12 months. MS shares are currently priced at 11.25x this year’s forecasted earnings, which makes them relatively expensive compared to the industry’s -61.29x forward p/e ratio. And for those looking to make a return holding the stock, the company pays shareholders $0.60 per share annually in dividends, yielding 2.24%. Consensus earnings for the current quarter by the 23 sell-side analysts covering the stock is an estimate of $0.63 per share, which would be $0.16 worse than the year-ago quarter and a $0.13 sequential decrease. What we find to be interesting is that the full-year EPS estimate of $2.38 is a $0.32 worse when compared to the previous year’s annual results. The quarterly earnings estimate is predicated on a consensus revenue forecast of $8.44 Billion. If reported, that would be a 11.72% decrease over the year-ago quarter. In terms of ratings, Portales Partners upgraded MS from Underperform to Sector Perform (Feb 16, 2016). Previously, JP Morgan upgraded MS from Neutral to Overweight. Given all the information above, we should disclose to readers that the average price target is $32.30, which is 20.88% above than it opened this morning. See more in (NYSE:MS) Similar Articles: Stock Update: Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS) – Sell the recent equity rally, says Morgan Stanley Market Update: Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS) – Bank of England hires lead managers for 2016’s 3-year USD bond Stock Update (NYSE:MS): Virginia reaches $63 mln pact with 11 banks in mortgage bond fraud suit